Rest in Peace Mikeal Rogers

Rest in peace Mikeal, an open source legend and my first real boss at my first real job. The first true renaissance-person I’d met in my life.

Back in 2013, I’d recently dropped out of school to pursue designing software. Getable had previously denied my application but Mikeal gave me a shot anyway to work as their first designer. There, I worked with a small, ragtag group of engineers he’d led and helped assemble - all self taught, kinda punk-rock dudes from Portland, all passionate about open source.

At the time, I knew he was an important figure in the early days of Node.js, but I didn’t quite grasp to what extent until we’d stopped working together and I came to understand how important Node was to the world. However, I got tastes of it when he’d invite me to dinners with important Node figures where I was in way over my head, but he welcomed me anyway.

When I asked about his background, I just remember he told me he’d moved to The Bay from Portland to work on some anarchist publication and then ended up teaching himself how to code. How could a technical person be this cool?

I don’t think I’d met someone that passionate and eager to share before. When I think about git, branching, and PRs, I still visualize the diagram he drew for me on the whiteboard. He taught me about good coffee and good food. Years before the ubiquity of Blue Bottle or Sight Glass, he insisted on the Technivorm Moccamaster and told me about sourcing green beans and self-roasting. He taught me about making dough for ramen noodles. Some of his lunches were some of the most expensive meals I’d had in my life - he told me his philosophy on saving money was that saving makes you lazy - not work as hard.

To the chagrin of our more buttoned-up team-members, I remember Mikeal brought us to a sketchy industrial part of West Oakland. As soon as we got out of the car, our coworker looked at the converted industrial building surrounded by chainlink and barbed wire - exasperated, asked “is that where we’re eating?” It was Fusebox - probably the first Korean fusion restaurant in Oakland at the location that would become Soba Ichi and June’s Pizza many years later. My man was plugged in.

I’d met Mikeal at a very formative time in my life. I learned from him that there was no playbook and that it’s okay not to conform. You could walk the world pretty irreverently, be anti-establishment, a passionate technologist, and a maker in anything that sparked your curiosity. Do all that, take care of your community, and good things will follow.

And here I am now…living in Oakland, working in open source and decentralized finance, food pop-ups, and learning to make wine. The through-line and influence is all there. Thanks for everything, Mikeal.